The Good, The Bad & The Ugly from Baylor's Week of Sports

Baylor Football won't finish the 2022 season with a perfect record. Still, despite the physical and emotional bruises coming out of Saturday night's loss to BYU, all goals remain on the table. 

But what comes next depends entirely on how this team responds to adversity. Faced with plenty of challenges, the Bears went down swinging in defeat, and their efforts didn't go unnoticed. There was just too much to overcome in the end. 

Here's a look at The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly from the Bears' double-overtime loss at BYU. 

The Good

Valuable Experience — The Bears found themselves in a good old-fashioned pier-six brawl in Provo. In the end, BYU landed the finishing blows, backed by big plays and a rowdy home crowd. And further aided by Baylor's numerous self-inflicted wounds. Even with all those advantages, the Cougars needed double overtime to earn the victory. By no means am I spinning this result as a good loss. Despite all the miscues, it was definitely an ugly loss because it was a winnable game. But, I do believe this team is now better equipped for the remaining obstacles ahead, assuming they learn from this weekend. General frustration is warranted, but BYU deserves credit, as well. 

Key Performances — Sqwirl Williams and Qualan Jones provided a solid 1-2 punch at RB following Taye McWilliams' early injury. Sqwirl is a star in the making if he could handle a sizable workload each week. Jones ripped off some effective yards in critical moments. LB Tyrone Brown came up huge in place of an ejected Dillon Doyle. Matt Jones is a madman in the best kind of way. Al Walcott's cast was the only thing preventing him from potentially turning this game on its head. The offensive line scrapped all night, and the defense made some huge stops. 

Road Trip / Rivalry — I was not in attendance, instead following along on others' adventures via social media and this website. I've never been to Utah, period. But, seeing and reading so many reviews, it sounds like a must-visit in the future Big 12. So many have mentioned the potential of this future rivalry throughout the last week. Still, seeing how this win registered emotionally for the Cougars, this does have the makings of a terrific rivalry moving forward — one currently defined by mutual respect, physicality, and home-field advantages. 

Gabriel Mayberry-USA TODAY Sports

The Bad

Injuries — Monaray Baldwin & Taye McWilliams were both forced out of action with injuries, further depleting an offense lacking game-breakers. McWilliams took a gnarly hit, so it wasn't surprising to see him exit with a likely concussion. Baldwin headed towards the locker room right before halftime, never returning on the night. It was just another batch of unfortunate circumstances, but without Baldwin in particular, a glaring light was shown on the Bears' lack of proven playmakers. 

Kicking Game — #CollegeKickers is a thing for a reason, but in this case, it wasn't a good thing for the Bears or Cougars. Not sure what was going on with Isaiah Hankins' attempts, but his missed extra point was a gut punch after Baylor finally broke their scoring drought. Add it to the list of "just one of those nights" moments. He also missed a 43-yard attempt in the first overtime.

On the other side, Jake Oldroyd's two gut-wrenching misses went from potentially winning to costing BYU the game before ultimately becoming afterthoughts in the fog of celebration. He at least connected from 39 yards at one point, to his credit. 

Road Woes — Winning big games at true road sites remains an elusive task for Aranda's Bears and Baylor Football to a more significant extent. Seeing a crowd and setting like Saturday night, it's understandable they couldn't overcome all odds to disrupt that trend. But a different result was in reach at multiple turns.  

Hall to Roberts, Roberts to Hall — Chase Roberts made everyone forget about injured WR Puka Nacua and Gunner Romney. QB Jaren Hall was terrific and found Roberts early and often, plus the two connected in reverse on the trick play TD. A dynamic duo for the Cougars in the win.  

Gabriel Mayberry-USA TODAY Sports

The Ugly

Miscues and Mistakes — It was a stormy night to play sloppy football. Blake Shapen did not have his best showing by a long shot, Hankins missed two crucial kicks, and let's not forget 14 penalties for over 100 yards. Ben Sims' holding call wiped out a Sqwirl TD in the first overtime. Elsewhere, there were missed blocks, tackles, and so forth. The crowd forced some mistakes, but the number of penalties was poison to the Bears' overall efforts, particularly on their final drive.  

The Final Drive — The Bears' second OT drive looked great initially but cratered after reaching 1st and goal at the 5-yard line thanks to two false start penalties. Absolute killers but a fitting way to ultimately fall short, pushing the Bears backward and leading to Shapen unsuccessfully launching a last-ditch fourth-down pass to Seth Jones, which sailed high. 

#Big12AfterDark — So, I fully welcome the Big 12's takeover of an all-important late night slot on Saturdays, especially given Pac-12 folks' tendency to brag about the late window as their advantage. But, my goodness, I'm a night owl, and CFB junkie that covers Baylor, and even I had a hard time not wanting to drift off to sleep in the later stages of this game. Brett Yormark will need to add more western flavor to make a regular late-night window work effectively. I've now learned it's one thing to randomly drop in on Wazzu-Cal with no dog in the fight in the wee hours and something else entirely to be invested in a game occurring that late into the night. It's exhausting. Had the Bears won, it might have been easier to find another wind, but alas.